1230 WBVP, 99.3 FM and beavercountyradio.com’s Tom Hays and Bruce Fry have the call from Sarg Alberts Stadium on the campus of Central Valley High School for this WPIAL WPIAL Class 4A vs Class 3A Non-Conference high school football game as the Cougars battle the defending champion Warriors.
The Game will also be presented via Facebook Live on the Beaver County Radio Facebook Page. Just Click the link below at game time:
If you can’t tune into the game you can click the link below to listen on-line via beavercountyradio.com:
1460 WMBA’s Bob Barrickman and Jason Colangelo have the call from The Pit at Aliquippa High School of this WPIAL Class 4A vs Class 3A Non-Conference high school football game as the Quips battle the Bridgers.
If you can’t listen to the game on the air and want to hear it via the Trib-Live High School Sports Network click the link below. The stream doesn’t start til the pre-game:
(Chippewa Township, PA) 72 years ago, WBVP started broadcasting local high school football and basketball games on the radio. Over the years, there have been several changes, improvements and innovations to the traditional A.M. radio broadcasts, including utilizing cell phone technology instead of old copper phone lines to send a feed back to the studio, broadcasting the games on F.M., and distributing the programs via an online audio stream. Friday night, yet another milestone was achieved as the station created a live video feed from Blackhawk Stadium to cover the Cougars season opener against the visiting Beaver Bobcats. Viewers to Friday night’s radio and video simulcast of the Blackhawk vs. Beaver high school football game were treated to live video synced with the play by play of Beaver County Radio broadcasters, Bob Barrickman and Jason Colangelo.
The stations had been dabbling in video streaming parts of their programming off and on for about 2 years. Recently, with the announcement that high school football games in Pennsylvania would in fact be played, but with limited fan attendance allowed due to COVID 19 restrictions, Program Director Frank Sparks convinced station ownership to invest in cameras and other equipment, and start video streaming high school football broadcasts. Sparks added “It was a perfect opportunity to fill a void and serve area residents who would have wanted to watch the games in person, but could not under the circumstances.” The new high tech audio and video simulcasts will also surely increase station usage and popularity throughout the fall on high school football game days, too. And so far, the gamble seems to be paying off. Friday night’s video program post reached over 5,200 people so far, and it also had many viewers posting positive accolades on social media about the station’s efforts to make the game available in a video format.
Here is the inaugural touchdown broadcast from an on site live stream video format created by Beaver County Radio:
Chuck Wilson broadcasting on WBVP in the early days at a Geneva College basketball game. Photo Courtesy of Bobbie Wilson-Tkacik.
The tradition of describing high school sporting events over the airwaves of WBVP began in 1948 with veteran, beloved broadcaster, Chuck Wilson, calling the action from behind a giant Western Electric bird cage ribbon microphone. Over the years, radio station listeners got to hear the dazzling plays made by about a dozen local future NFL Superbowl Champions, as they got their first publicity over the airwaves on WBVP, in Beaver Falls and WMBA in Ambridge. When history was being made in sports, WBVP and WMBA were there, and Friday was no exception. Although, it was the stations making a historic “play”, along with the athletes, on this balmy early fall night under the lights in Chippewa. Out on the field, it was a game that Blackhawk won 22-7.
Bob Barrickman, and Jason Colangelo call the play by Play while Malik Garrett directs the cameras and scene shots for the broadcast with a computer out at Blackhawk Stadium Friday Night.Antonia Rotuna operates a camera for Beaver County Radio atop the press box at Blackhawk Stadium Friday Night.
In addition to Barrickman and Colangelo, Additional radio station staffers including Malik Garrett, Antonia Rotuna, Sly Washington and Rick Plassmeyer were onsite at Blackhawk Stadium to help produce the multi media feed.
Beaver County Radio has plans to do an audio/video simulcast from a featured game of the week throughout the season. Broadcast schedules can be found here.
(Chippewa Twp., Pa.) In this week’s edition of “Thru the Eyes of Sly Washington” we travel to Blackhawk High School for Beaver vs. Blackhawk. A beautiful late summer night set the stage for opening night of high school football here in Beaver County. The game was a first for Beaver County Radio in broadcasting the game live on Facebook along with 1230 WBVP, 99.3 FM and beavercountyradio.com. Blackhawk took the opening kick-off and marched 73 yards down the field for a 7-0 lead early on. The remainder of the the first half resulted in 4 turnovers including a fumble from the Bobcats and interceptions by the Cougars. The half ended with a score of 16-0 in favor of the Cougars. To start the second half, Beaver came out strong and managed to get the ball in the end zone during the third. Unfortunately, for the Bobcats, Blackhawk continued to use their power to move the ball down the field to secure the win. The game ended with a final score of 22 – 7.
Check out the pictures of these weeks edition of “Thru the Eyes of Sly Washington” below…
Central Valley opened its season with a decisive 51-2 victory over Hopewell at Tony Dorsett Stadium Friday night. Central Valley led 7-2 after the first quarter and the Warriors poured on 26 points in the second quarter to bust the game wide open. Central Valley’s Myles Walker was CCBC Player of the Game. Hopewell’s Roman Whittington was the CCBC selection for Hopewell.
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